


Dear Keith Kogane

by WhiteLionOfVoltron



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Deathfic, Drabble, M/M, Short One Shot, Suspense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-02
Updated: 2017-10-02
Packaged: 2019-01-07 23:50:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12243018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhiteLionOfVoltron/pseuds/WhiteLionOfVoltron
Summary: Lance and Keith end up trapped in a cave, slowly bleeding to death and suffocating. Lance plays games and thinks to pass the time.





	Dear Keith Kogane

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry in advance.

Lance has never been that religious.

Occasionally, he’d pray with his family. Mainly during holiday dinners or in times of crisis. But he’s never really been the type to pray before bed every night or go to church on Sunday without a little force.

Until now. Until this exact moment in time where he’s repenting every sinful act, every middle finger, every scandalous thought to ever cross his young mind. Begging God for forgiveness for every night he’d stayed up watching movies or playing video games instead of saying thanks for his good graces.

Because Lance is going to die.

They’re all going to die, if he’s honest. Trapped, no help and nowhere to go. At least, he _thinks_ they’re all trapped. The explosion had brought the entire cave in on top of them, and as far as he knows they were all still inside when it happened. Keith is lying not six feet away from him, flushed pink cheeks smudged with ash and dirt, hair sticking to his forehead and cheeks as he sweats profusely. Hunk had been some ways down the cavern with Pidge, and they might possibly be safe. Shiro had been waiting for them outside, so his chances of being alive are exponentially higher than Keith’s. Lance’s only indication that Keith is still alive right now are the wheezy breaths escaping from his fair lips that are cracked slightly apart to show gritted teeth as the rocks bear down on his legs and hips. Lance is in much better shape in his opinion, a mass of rocks pinning his left arm to the floor of the tunnel with the weight of six elephants, give or take a few. He can’t even feel it anymore, aside from a dull tingling sensation in his fingertips that he can’t move. He numbly wonders if he’ll even be able to use it if they get him out. If he lives anyway. At least if he can’t the team will be able to find someone better to do his job. This whole explosion had been his fault to begin with anyway. If he’d just listened to Shiro and waited five seconds instead of going out after Keith maybe his gun wouldn’t have set off those explosives.

Of course Keith would’ve been killed so he supposes the former might not have been the worst decision. Still, it’s hard not to wonder if he _had_ chosen right. Maybe Keith could’ve handled it and Lance just fucked the whole thing up.

Oops, there’s another one for the swear jar.

Lance laughs out loud at himself, though it’s more of a forced, raspy bark. He coughs as his raw throat protests the sound and groans. He’d inhaled the equivalent of an entire convenience store of cigarette’s smoke when the tunnel collapsed and his lungs made sure he knew that. His head is pounding and his stomach feels like it’s been crushed by a two-ton truck. Blood from a blow to his temple is dripping steadily down his face and his hair is sticky and wet with it.

It idly occurs to him, in this hazy and concussed state that everyone else might just be dead.

Shiro, Allura, even Coran and the mice and that stupid cow might well have been killed in the…how long had they been in here anyway? A few Vargas maybe? For all he knows it could have been days and he’d just been unconscious for that long. Probably not though. When Lance had opened his eyes, dust from the explosion had been settling over their small crevice of dirt and rocks.

As if things couldn’t be any worse, the air of the tiny den is getting thinner and thinner, making Lance lightheaded as he takes small, wispy breaths. It won’t be long before one of a few things happens.

Either A, Lance and Keith will die from blood loss or infection.

B, they will both suffocate as the oxygen literally disappears from the hole.

Or C, they’ll starve to death, be crushed by settling rocks, or die from dehydration.

He may have left a few things out, but for a nearly incoherent thought it’s pretty well put together.

He’s bored too, not wanting to sleep but having nothing to do, so he’s settled for both admiring and making fun of the unconscious teen lying opposite him.

Currently, he’s mentally berating him for running into the middle of a Galra patrol and making Lance go out after him to keep him from getting himself killed. He’s done it a few times already but it’s hard to think up new insults when you’re trying not to die.

In his mind he can almost see Keith’s retorts, and somehow it’s comforting.

He’s about halfway through a silent tirade about how stupid his hair is when Keith coughs and groans, opening his eyes.

“Lance?”

His voice, like Lance’s is just above a whisper, crackly and weak.

“The prince of—" Lance pauses to take a breath. “bad haircuts joins the land of the living.”

Keith rolls his eyes and raises his head off the ground with great effort, looking back at his legs with a grimace.

“H—”

“Dunno,” Lance cuts him off, knowing exactly what Keith is going to ask because he asked the same questions himself when he woke up.

“You okay?” he huffs.

“’M fine,” he lies unconvincingly.

Keith nods, not because he believes Lance but because he’s accepted that neither of them are okay enough to admit they’re hurt to the other. Normally, it’s Keith that brushes off injuries and Lance that makes a big deal. But for broken bones or concussions or anything more serious than a bump or a bruise or even a paper cut, Lance waits until it’s quiet to either tell them he’s hurt, or just pass out. (Or both, depending on his mood.)

Keith, with his limited medical training, mentally assesses Lance for damages instead, already spotting a badly broken arm, a concussion, and probably internal bleeding. For himself, he surprisingly finds only one broken leg and a sprained ankle from the waist down, considering the pressure that the tons and tons of earth are exuding upon his small figure. He feels pretty dazed so he suspects a concussion and—

He stops himself. It’s hardly even worth going over everything anymore. He settles for the prognosis of the two of them are fucked and nothing else worthy of note.

Silence ensues for what must’ve been several hours, the cave darkening as the limited amount of light from a hole the size of a few worms goes out. Their broken helmets are somewhere crushed beneath the rubble on Keith’s side where they’d left them after taking them off during their agonizingly long stakeout session, so there’s no way to contact the rest of the team, if they’re even still there to contact.

They look at each other occasionally, exchanging silent words.

_‘You holdin’ up okay?’_

_‘What do you think?’_

_‘I’m sorry.’_

_‘Me too.’_

Lance stares around at the rocks closing them in and thinks up each different way one of them could fall and crush the heads of the two Paladins trapped beneath them, and he starts to cry around the time his fingers lose the rest of their feeling. He drifts into unconsciousness soon after that, leaving Keith alone.

Somehow Keith knows Lance isn’t dead. He doesn’t know if it’s this thing between Paladins or because he and Lance have a certain understanding. They don’t hate each other, so much as loathe being in the same room together. It’s a fine line. He has no idea why Lance hated him so much to begin with but just the sheer fact that he did made Keith angry. No matter how great a shooter Lance was or how terrible his pick-up lines were, Keith always found some way to hate him for it.

He doesn’t really do that anymore, just silently accepts that Lance will never see him as a close friend or anything more than a rival.

And he doesn’t know if he’s okay with that or not.

Lance opens his eyes again a while later, even more hazy than before. Keith is only half-lucid, drifting in limbo between darkness and consciousness. The air feels even tighter than before, and Lance has grown hungry. His stomach aches even worse because of it and his mouth is as dry as the desert where the Garrison sat.

The tension between the two can be cut with a knife as Keith silently looks over and acknowledges Lance’s return to consciousness.

“You okay?” he breathes.

“Fuck you,” Lance responds simply, not really directed at Keith but just at everything in general. Mainly Keith for asking the question, but that’s aside the point.

Keith lets out a small hum instead of the insult he’d planned to hurl back, too tired and thirsty to start an argument.

“We’re gonna die, huh?” he hears Lance ask in a tiny voice, breaking into a whisper as he chokes on tears.

“Prob’ly,” Keith admits, coughing. Specks of blood splatter on the ground in front of him.

The response hangs in the air as Lance heaves for air.

“’M s’rry,” he mumbles.

“Mhm,” Keith murmurs, sighing shakily.

“I…If…,” Lance swallows. “’F I don’t make it out…in my room. There’s…” a cough. “There’s a letter. Under m-my mattress.”

Keith looks at him.

“M’kay,” he responds.

“’S for you,” he affirms, though the tone of his voice had already suggested that.

Keith shoots him a shaky thumbs up.

Since they had started talking, the two begin to play road games, mainly things like hangman since I Spy is out of the question.

Lance uses it as an opportunity to figure Keith out. Movies, books, even famous people and locations. Keith isn’t the most savvy at most things, but he gets animals pretty well and he’s pretty good at mechanical terms. It tells Lance he didn’t have much fun growing up. It takes him twelve fucking minutes to guess Star Wars.

Swear jar number two.

He also uses it to keep himself awake.

Contrary to his actions of accepting death, Lance doesn’t want to die. He wants to go home and see his mother and his little nieces and nephews and his over-protective big brothers and sisters. But he knows that death isn’t a controllable thing, and so he faces it with pride.

That doesn’t mean he isn’t scared. No, he’s terrified. But he doesn’t let Keith know, even if he suspects his older friend already does.

Keith, on the other hand, is not scared. He guesses he will be, when he realizes Shiro isn’t coming or when he does look death in the eye, but Keith has nothing to live for anyway. His family was gone, and Shiro could live without him. He doubts the other Paladins would miss him very much, and God knows Lance won’t care.

But he doesn’t want to die either. He wants to live long enough to stop Zarkon and save the universe for everyone else. He wants to help Pidge find her family and to see Lance get back to family and to eat more of Hunk’s food because holy shit he’s an amazing cook. He wants to help Allura avenge her people and so much more.

But there are other people that can do that. He understands it. He just won’t accept it.

As they continue their little games, Lance’s responses grow softer and his speech slurs more and more often.

Dammit.

Keith tries to keep him awake as long as he can, he tries so hard.

But it isn’t enough.

Lance drops off halfway through a round.

“Lance,” Keith mutters, looking over at him. Oh God…is he breathing?

“Lance!”

The rocks crumble around the small hole.

_“Lance!”_

Voices drift down from above him.

“LANCE!”

The Blue Lion roars and her massive paw digs away the rest of the rocks.

**_“LANCE!”_ **

* * *

_Dear Keith Kogane,_

_If you’re reading this, I’m dead._

_I guess I should start from the beginning._

_When I first saw you fly that simulator, I loathed your very existence. You were so damn good at everything you did and I hated you for it. I did everything you did but did it get me anything? No. Iverson hated me, my classmates thought I was a joke, and Shiro wouldn’t even look at me._

_And then you quit. I found myself missing the insults and the unspoken resentment._

_I enjoyed hating you._

_Even now you top me at everything I do, but it’s weird because I don’t hate it as much anymore. The competitions, the arguing?_

_I like that._

_I like you._

_I know I know, I’m a dick because I didn’t tell you. I couldn’t. Do you have any idea how scary that is? I’m supposed to be this macho guy that hates you and flirts with ladies but_

_I don’t know. I was scared to tell you because I thought you’d just flat out stop talking to me together._

_But all the times I’ve insulted your stupid hair and that dumbass way you just don’t get how to be a human being were just me trying to get you to pay attention to me._

_BTW I thought you were really cute when you were confused so I made it a point to fuck with your brain a lot._

_I’ve left you a few things, my jacket and my memory card (it’s sorta like a diary) so you can do whatever you want with them. Just make sure when you’re finished you give the memory card back to my folks. And make sure they know what happened._

_I’m really sorry again for everything. I’m sorry for not telling you before…well, y’know._

_I love you. So so very much._

_Sincerely,_

_Me._

**Author's Note:**

> I warned you I apologize.


End file.
